Giving Your All
Notes
Transcript
Has anyone here ever invested in somthing?
Maybe its flipping a house
Maybe you invested in a relationship
Maybe you invested in a business
So probably all of us right?
Well look at the screen, this is Ron Wayne and Ron has a place in history as one of the people to make the worse decions in investment history.
Because Ron was actually one of the original co founders of apple and he, steve jobs and a few other guys got the company off the ground
Well in 1976 ( shortly after apple got off the ground)Ron decided that he was going to sell his 10% stake in the company for $800
Now if you are familiar with apple you know that they have grown a good amount.
And as a result the share prices rose
And today if Ron kept his share in the company it would have actually been worth around 95 Billion (with a B) dollars
But the truth is we all have things in our life that we choose too invest in and not too invest in.
And sometimes those things are good and other times they are not the best investments.
And really today we are looking at a story and there are two people in it that I want to look at
and they are not investing in a business, but really what we see is they are choosing what is it they invest their life in
and what we see is one chooses to invest their life wisely, but the other decides to begin to invest their life into something else.
Because the truth is each of us invest our life in something and we have to decide what it is we want to invest our life in.
So we are going to be John 12:1-8 and this is continuing our series that we are in called “Around The Table” where we have been looking at these meals that Jesus had with others.
And let me just start in the first couple verses because the context of this story
So look at John 12 starting in verse one and going into part of verse 2. it just says this:
John 12:1–2 (NIV)
Jesus Anointed at Bethany
12:1–8Ref—Mt 26:6–13; Mk 14:3–9; Lk 7:37–39
12 Six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus lived, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. 2 Here a dinner was given in Jesus’ honor…
So this is taking place leading up to Jesus entering Jeruselum which would in about a weeks time lead him to dying on the cross.
And so at this point Jesus has been teaching and has worked a lot of miracles
And probably one of the most amazing miricles he has done was for a guy named Lazareus (who was the brother of the two sisters named Mary and Martha, that we talked about last week).
And the amazing thing is Lazarus was actually dead, but Jesus had brought him back to life.
And I know this is just context but this is probably the most important part of the story because if we do not understand this first part we will miss the rest of the story.
Because this maricle that Jesus did with Lazarus was a very physical miricle. I mean Lazarus was dead and now He is alive.
But regardless of if God has worked a physical maricle in your life there is a maricle that He can work in every person, where we are dead in our sin, but He gives us life.
And that sounds a little harsh saying we are dead in our sins
Because we believe God is the ultimate giver of life right? I mean He created everything, so its from God that our lives become filled and alive.
And so when we are not living a life in a relationship with God we are cutting off the very thing that gives life in our lives.
And it causes damage
Its easy to forget our value that we were created in the image of God and that the God of the universe loves you more than you ever know.
Its easy to let toxic things creep into our lives where it causes damage to our lives and others
It becomes easy to feel like our lives are purposeless when God has called us to live for Him.
Its almost like if you think about a blood clot
because what happens if there is a blood clot in your body? The clot blocks off the life giving substance of blood from getting to the rest of your body right?
And if you have a blood clot a lot of times you can still function, in fact sometimes you can even go a little bit without realizing they have one
but the truth is that whenever a area is blocked it has the ability to cause damage, pain, it can even kill you if the clot is serious enough.
And really thats what our lives can look like, whether we have blocked God out of our entire life or if we just have certain places,
But here is the beautiful thing, because while all of us have had areas where we were spiritually dead, God can give life to those areas and that is a maricle.
And really in our lives whether we have experienced a physical miracle or spiritual one (where we have entered into a relationship with Jesus).
We should be able to stand in awe of what God has done.
And really this is where every person who was at this dinner would have been.
They were in awe of Jesus for what He had done in Lazarus’s life, but also probably their own.
And so they honor Jesus with this big dinner and look what it says in verses 2-3 because what we are going to see is that the awe leads to an action.
So I am going to reread that first part of verse 2. It says this:
2 Here a dinner was given in Jesus’ honor. Martha served, while Lazarus was among those reclining at the table with him. 3 Then Mary took about a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus’ feet and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.
So they honor Jesus with this big meal, and there are those two sisters we talked about last week Martha (who was the worker) and Mary (who sat at Jesus’s feet)
And I want to focus in on Mary, because this was an emotional dinner, because you can picture on one side of her is this man who brought her brother back to life and on the other side is this her brother
And like I said earlier, the awe leads to action
Say that with me: The awe leads to action
and in Marys case it actually leads her to do something really radical.
She takes a pint of this expensive Nard oil (about the size of this water bottle) and this was a really expensive perfume at this time.
I mean does anyone remember those spray cans of Axe that teenagers loved?
This stuff would have put the axe cans to shame
In fact the ingrediants of this perfume could only be found in India (which was a long trip)
even later we learn this perfume was worth about a years wage or salary.
So this perfume was more expensive then we can imagine.
But here is the really radical part of this because Mary takes this perfume and she actually gets down to Jesus’s feet, lets her hair out and pours out this expensive perfume all over Jesus’s feet and begins to wipe his feet with her hair.
And its easy to read this and go thats weird, but really what she is doing is flowing out of her love for Jesus.
and its not out of obligation, but its because she loves Him so much how could she do this for Him?
Its almost like when you buy Christmas presents for someone, there are two catagories of people you buy for
You buy for the people you are obligated to (they bought me this present so I guess I should get them somthing)
And usually these are not the people we are supper close with
But then there is another (that a lot of times is with our kids or family) where we go how could I not get this person a present because I love them that much.
And this is where Mary is, the awe she is expearinceing is not an obligation, but its where it is moving her to say Jesus have all of me.
And look at the next few verses from verse 4 to verse 8 because someone raises concern to Jesus and I want to you notice the difference. It says this:
4 But one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, who was later to betray him, objected, 5 “Why wasn’t this perfume sold and the money given to the poor? It was worth a year’s wages.” 6 He did not say this because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it. 7 “Leave her alone,” Jesus replied. “It was intended that she should save this perfume for the day of my burial. 8 You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me.”
So Judas and the disciples are also at this dinner and Judas goes “what are you doing?!” Don’t you know what this perfume could have been used for? How many people could we have helped? and you wasted it all.
And I dont know if this is a red flag to agree with Judus, but does anyone else go… “maybe Judus has a point? there could have been a lot more done with this money.
But there is a really important point here, because we can give our all to others and good can happen, but thats not a kingdom minded goal.
Because a kingdom minded goal is saying lets give our all to God, so we can give His all to everyone.
Because His all is better then our all.
And I really believe God calls us help the poor, but we are going to make a bigger impact through Him then ourselves
And we even learn that Judas’s intentions were not good because we are told he kept the money and really was thinking, wow I could probably take some of this.
And I know there is a lot to unpack here, but can I just point out the differences,
because I have 24 dollars and say these 24 dollars represent a day of my life (every dollar represents a day)
I If I had to guess Judas is thinking in his head I have given Jesus a parts of me. I follow Him around- and he is going- I have given a good amount of these dollars to Jesus-
But here is the issue this is actually not a good way to spend our lives where we say Jesus here is a part of it.
Because we can make some poor choices with the rest.
And we all probably know this but Judas does that
But then Mary has her 24 dollars and what she is doing in this instance is not saying here is a big part of me, (here is 20 dollars), but she is saying here is all of me.
There is no part of my life off limits
And then God directs her life.
It would be like if I gave wanted to have one of you be my financial advisor (insert name… I feel like I can trust you) I would give you all the money and then you would tell me how to spend it.
And on a serius note that is what we are called to do.
And this does not look like being a monk, but its saying God Ill use the talents youve given me to glorify you
Ill use my resources where ever you are calling me
Ill give you my time
And really saying ill give you all of me.
And so as we close I think we have an option where we can do this watered down Christianity where we might come to church, do good things and give God a few dollars,
Or we can say I am ready for you to have it all.
And so we are going to be finishing on the song “At the Cross”
and I want you to reflect on the miracle God has worked in your life and what would it look like for the awe of that miricle to lead to the action.
Where every 24 hours whether sleeping or awake is not off limits for the God of the universe.
Lets pray.